Can you guys believe I’m back to recap a reality show where everyone except one of the couples should not be together? No, I’m not talking about Vanderpump Rules, but Love is Blind, the Netflix sensation sweeping the nation.
Vanessa and Obviously Nick Lachey are back to host and to once again prove to us that their entire presence on this show is completely useless. How many times do you think the phrase “you got ENGAGED to someone SIGHT UNSEEN regardless of LOOKS, RACE, INCOME” will be uttered? Take a shot for every time it’s said, and then meet me in the hospital immediately after the show.
No one:
Absolutely no one:
Nick & Vanessa Lachey every 16 seconds: you got engaged to someone you NEVER SAW. You’re here to PROVE if LOVE is really BLIND. This is a REVOLUTIONARY EXPERIME—— sarafcarter (@sarafcarter) February 29, 2020
Here at the reunion are Lauren and Cam, Amber and Barnett, Jessica and Mark, Kenny and Kelly, and Diamond and Carlton. Amber has gone blonde, and I do feel like that choice better captures her chaotic energy.
Mark, Jessica, Diamond, Carlton, and Kelly are currently single, and miraculously, both couples that got married on the show are still married. I’ve got to say, I fully expected Barnett and Amber to implode by now.
Damian and Gigi are back together, which isn’t a shock really since we knew that already. It is a shock in the sense that they are extremely toxic, but whatever, it’s not my life.
First up is Kenny and Kelly. Kenny is dating someone, but Kelly is single. Since the show, Kelly’s dated one of her best friends who was at their wedding. And meanwhile, I’ve been going on year five without a man, so… somebody nominate me for season 2. Kelly says some B.S. about “growth” and her “journey” from the show or whatever, and Kenny is flexing real hard that he’s got a new girlfriend. I can’t hate the guy because I’d be doing the same thing, though.
Amber’s first comment is that she “hasn’t killed Barnett yet”, which honestly, I really thought would happen. Well, more accurately, I thought she’d pull a Lorena Bobbitt on him, but same idea.
So Gigi and Damian are “so together” (once again, methinks the lady doth protest too much). She already starts tearing up while talking about waking up next to Damian every day. Call me cynical, but I’m going to stick to my theory that they’re both actors. That was a pretty good performance, though, I’ll give them that.
Lauren and Cam, dream couple, are still married, and Mark is single, wearing less and going out more. Ya love to see it.
Barnett looks back on him leading on three girls in the pod simultaneously and has #noregrets. They never do, do they? He claims he’s “not super good with girls.”
All of us: 
We know what we saw in the pod, Barnett.
Amber talks about how all the girls were together in the pod (I forgot about that part) and she and LC had an agreement that they just wouldn’t talk about Barnett to each other. Jessica, meanwhile, told Amber that Barnett was proposing (she was also holding her beloved bottle of Joel Gott red wine and slurring her words at the time, classic Messica). Amber calls Jessica sheisty for throwing herself at Barnett in Mexico. Honestly, go off sis.
Jessica admits that she didn’t take Barnett’s rejection very well (you can say that again) and apologizes to Amber. Good move Jessica, Amber won’t stab you in the heart with her stiletto heel… today. Jessica says she has no hard feelings toward Amber, to which Amber just laughs. Jessica, on second thought, you might want to sleep with one eye open.
Vanessa and Nick are so f*cking messy, asking Amber if she accepts Jessica’s apology, and then when Amber explains her thought process that she felt like she looked like a fool for being friends with Jessica, they just cut in like “okay but do you accept the apology OR NAH?”
DO YOU ACCEPT JESSICA’S APOLOGY, YES OR NO!
Like damn, let Amber speak! I know y’all want to be seen as relevant or at all integral to this show, but we didn’t come here for you.
Amber says she accepts “the intent behind the apology” but not the apology itself yet. I love that non-acceptance-acceptance, it feels straight out of the Real Housewives of Potomac.
So everyone loves Lauren (same), and Damian reminisces on how he and Lauren used to talk to each other in Star Wars voices and had a great time in the pod, and Giannina is plotting all the ways in which she could murder her and then flee the country, never to be heard from again.
Me to Lauren:
Why am I relating everything to murder in this recap? Because of who I am as a person.
We relive Carlton and Diamond’s engagement. Oh, this is gonna be awkward. I’m taking a deep breath as we revisit the Carlton/Diamond breakup in Mexico. For the record, I can see both sides. If I were Diamond, I’d be upset that Carlton had all the time in the pods to bring up his sexuality, but waited until we were engaged to reveal that to me. But on the other hand, I can obviously understand why Carlton would be hesitant to share that information. And if Diamond didn’t have a problem with his sexuality in the first place, then the revelation probably would not have been a big deal, even with the timing.
Wow, I almost forgot how Carlton told Diamond to watch her wig. A truly iconic reality TV moment.
Carlton cries and expresses regret for not talking to Diamond earlier. I can’t tell if I would be happy if these two got back together. Their fight was explosive, but they were kinda cute in the pods?
Okay, never mind, Diamond says that she would never be back with Carlton because of the way he disrespected her during their fight.
Obviously, Nick is like, “I think what I’m hearing from both of you is that you both regret being messy af during that fight.” Yeah dude, we’ve spent the last 10 minutes saying exactly that.
Then Carlton gets up, says he’s NOT PROPOSING, kneels down with a ring box, to… apologize and give Diamond the ring back? Damn, Love is Blind has a higher budget than The Bachelor if Carlton is allowed to keep the ring. In The Bachelor, they have to be married for 2 years or else that shit goes back to Neil Lane.
Vanessa: OMG, I’m speechless.
Ok, stay that way! We didn’t come here for y’all!
Next up is the Damian and Gigi show, where Gigi claims she didn’t go into the pods with a pre-planned idea of proposing to Damian. Sure, Jan. Sure.
They’re still dating, but not living together, which is actually… a sensible thing to do? I’m actually shocked.
Watching the clip back of Gigi giving Damian his “bow” back, he starts tearing up. Can somebody call LA and get this guy an acting gig!? He cries and apologizes for putting her through the embarrassment of getting left at the altar on TV, but says he’d do it again because they’re in a better place now.
Okay, Gigi acknowledges that she self-sabotages (take a drink, because just like SIGHT UNSEEN is Nick and Vanessa’s catchphrase, self-sabotage is hers), and admitted that she blew up in non-productive ways. HA! To all you who doubted me in the comments of my other article, I say, HA!
And, she starts crying… ok, we get it, I’m convinced… of y’all’s acting skills. Just kidding, I’m sure they really love each other! I just can’t imagine watching that toxic tornado of a relationship on screen and thinking, “yeah, let’s totally give this another round.” These two really prove that love is blind, and also, unhealthy.
Vanessa is literally Lauren B. from The Bachelor, being like “I love that” to everything everybody says.
Vanessa: I love your love.
Me, audibly at my desk: Ew.
Now it’s time to talk about Kelly and Kenny, or as my friend put it, “the boring couple who I can’t believe didn’t get married in the end.” I do feel like they totally pulled a bait-and-switch on us, acting totally stable until the bitter end.
Kenny says all the takeaways he learned from the show, he applied to his new relationship. So he and his new gf only talk to each other through a wall! Just kidding, he’s learned to be vulnerable and whatever. Next.
Nobody:
Absolutely nobody:
Vanessa: I’ll say it: Kenny for President
Vanessa, we have enough white men in the race. We’re good.
Kelly immediately starts crying, and no wonder, because she’s gotten a lot of hate even though she says she and Kenny agreed to not get married beforehand. She says she loved Kenny but she wasn’t in love with him, and she wanted to continue dating but Kenny was like “nah, I’m good”. Ouch.
Kelly is all of us, admitting she’s friend-zoned all the good guys that she should probably be marrying. I’ll say it: Kelly for President! F*ck you, Vanessa.
Nick and Vanessa: Amber and Barnett, how’s married life been?
Barnett: Well, I live every day in constant fear that she’ll castrate me, so it’s a wild ride for sure.
I want to know if Amber has gotten a job, or at least a credit limit above $700? No shade, but I feel like a 12-year-old could get a higher credit limit than that. (Ok, maybe some shade.)
Amber admits that at one point she’d called a divorce lawyer, but they somehow made it through to the other side (maybe Amber realized she didn’t have enough money for a divorce?).
Finally, it’s what everyone’s been waiting for: The Hot Mess Jess Express. Frankly, I’m a little disappointed to see Contrite Jessica. She’s recognizing she drank too much, admitting she was working through a lot of issues that caused her to say wild sh*t, apologizing to Mark for implying he’s not good-looking. Of course, I’m happy for her and her growth, but who’s bringing the drama this reunion? I guess I’ll have to take one for the team and do it *downs an entire bottle of Malbec* let’s go.
Mark, true sensitive king, doesn’t throw Jessica under the bus, and still calls her a “phenomenal woman.” My exes wouldn’t piss on me if I was on fire, how do I get a Mark in my life?
Mark does admit that he wishes Jessica had told him that she still had feelings for Barnett, and Jessica blames it on the fact that she was served whiskey. LMAO! There she is! I’m going to start saying “Well, I was served whiskey” any time someone calls me out for doing something crazy when drunk. Girl, I don’t think that’s how it works.
There’s honestly no real need to recap the Lauren and Cameron love story. They’re happy, we’re happy, everyone’s happy. They have a puppy, so they’re officially goals.
Vanessa: We got a fur baby, and we were committing to what we’d be like as parents.
For the last time, Vanessa! This isn’t about you!
Cameron is such a cutie, talking about Lauren’s dad and crying. Cool, now I’m crying. I didn’t ask for this. They are the cutest, and if they ever break up I’ll have to take a week off work.
Lmao now Vanessa is crying. You know what girl, I’ll give you this one. Go ahead, cry it out.
Vanessa: Nick and I always said, this was a social experiment. This was a love experiment. But ultimately, your feelings were real.
Lol, acting as if they themselves designed the experiment instead of just popped up every time they were contractually obligated to give the same speech about LOVE BEING TRULY BLIND. Listen Netflix, on Love is Blind season 2, we don’t want a host. It’s not necessary. If you’re going to have a host, get Michelle Buteau from The Circle to make snarky remarks about everyone every 3 seconds. Otherwise, don’t bother.
And after going around the room and saying what everybody learned from the experience like this is f*cking summer camp, Vanessa has everyone raise their hands if they believe (get your drink ready) that love is really blind. Of course, everybody raises their hand. And with that, I leave you… to go apply for Love is Blind season 2. See you in the pods!
Images: Netflix; Giphy; sarafcarter / Twitter
Perhaps you, like me, spent your whole weekend binging Netflix’s new dating show Love Is Blind, and now you have a ton of questions. The main one being, why would someone ever want to go on this show? Are there seriously no other options for you, Barnett?
The show describes itself as a “social experiment” in which 30 participants have ten days to meet and propose to a partner. The twist? All of their dates take place in isolated pods, and they talk to their potential matches through a wall. And for some unclear reason, they still get more dressed up to sit alone in a room than I ever have in my entire life. After some couples find “the one”, the show jets everyone off to a resort in Mexico to see if they can create a physical connection, and then back to Atlanta to test if they will make it work in the real world. If they survive, like, a day with their partner in a random neutral apartment, they’ll be walking down the aisle and into the rest of their lives.
The show suspiciously does not give us many details as to how they chose their singles, but in an interview with E! Network after the show started streaming on Netflix, co-creator Chris Coelen revealed that all the singles were all based in Atlanta, and that the show was also filmed there. Okay, so, I’m just guessing here, but the social scene in Atlanta for young, attractive people willing to go on reality TV to get married cannot be that big.
I feel like there was a casting call posted in the greater Atlanta area that was like, “Want to be Instagram famous, but don’t want to move to LA or New York to do it? Can’t take a month off work because your feed isn’t paying for itself yet? We’ve got the opportunity for you!”
Marriage seems like a pretty high price to pay if the only reason you want to be on a reality TV show is to promote your brand. After digging a little deeper into their backgrounds, I found that half of the cast was willing to pay it. Alas, my faith in humanity grows ever smaller. Many of the contestants have personal brands or are the CEOs of their own media companies, or hold jobs like model, social media consultant, brand consultant, personal trainer, personal stylist, makeup artist, etc. Jobs that basically need all the exposure to clients they can get, and Netflix is just the place for that. (I have to give Netflix some credit, because they took away the cast’s phones during the month that they were filming, which seriously limited the number of times someone could reference their fake Instagram job in a confessional.)
I mean, the second we meet everyone at the start of the show, I was immediately suspicious. Everyone is way too hot. Like, definitely a few steps below The Bachelor, but still. Hot as far as regular, non-surgically-enhanced people go. I mean, Diamond Jack is literally an NBA dancer, which, as we all know, is a model who can also dance. And, as it turns out, a lot of them are actually models. Take Amber, for instance, who reminisces on her days in the Georgia Army in the first episode. Based on her Instagram, though, her current job is modeling for Tropic Beauty, whose Instagram bio is literally: “We produce model influencer events, photoshoots, travel and branding opportunities.”
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Know your worth… then add interest😘 . . . 📷: @bcphotography_ @tropicbeauty @_spraylavie
Lauren Speed is another example. Her bio on the show says “Content Creator”, which is the vaguest job description I have ever seen, and then we never hear another peep about it again. That is, until she shows Cameron, her new fiancé, her apartment, and there is a full-on photo studio in the living room. It turns out Lauren runs her own media company called The Speed Brand AND she has modeled in New York Fashion Week. I respect the hustle, but now I’ve got to ask how two literal models can really be on national TV claiming they hate dating apps because they get judged by their pictures.
Speaking of New York Fashion Week, another of the show’s participants, Danielle Drouin, recently posted from the runway. I don’t even remember her being on the show, and she clearly didn’t get engaged to anyone, so Netflix really wasted her hotness for nothing.
I also found in my midnight Googling spiral investigation that, in addition to all of these contestants being models, a bunch of them are weirdly connected. It does add up that some contestants would’ve known each other beforehand, given that it’s a show for the very specific demographic of model-adjacent singles in Atlanta, but something seems fishy here. It is a little hard to say, but more than a few contestants can be linked to Jezebel Magazine (a publisher of luxury lifestyle magazines, not the feminist website), which hosts tons of parties throughout the year. They named the show’s very own Mark Cuevas, (personal trainer, lover of Jessica, known 24-year-old) one of 2019’s 50 Most Beautiful Atlantans. Weird flex, but okay.
Matt Thomas, Mark’s confirmed friend, (which we know from this Instagram at an event for Thomas’ non-profit, Brawl for a Cause) and fellow contestant has also appeared in the magazine, as one of Atlanta’s Best Bodies of 2017. Not sure who gave the green light for that article, but that’s neither here nor there.
Lexie Skipper, a personal stylist (another vague job description) on Love is Blind, also had a profile in the magazine, although she unfortunately did not, at least to the extent of my research, make one of their rankings. Maybe next year, Lexie. Lastly, for what it’s worth, I found a picture of Jessica at a Jezebel party in 2011, so basically that confirms that everyone knows each other and the entire show is a scam.
Just kidding, but an anonymous source close to the show did tell Betches, “LC and Lexie are childhood friends.” The source told us that they went to the same middle school and have been pretty tight since then. Also, LC and Westley, who went to high school together, were one of LIB’s couples (that didn’t get engaged).
Look, I guess it kind of makes sense. Like maybe, some of them said to their friends, “I’m only going to apply for this if you do it with me.” And then their mom popped up out of nowhere and said “if every single in Atlanta jumped off a bridge, would you?” Pretty sure that’s how that went.
In the remainder of the cast, (those that aren’t models or fitfluencers), there are quite a few “brand consultants” and “social media entrepreneurs”. Giannina describes herself in her Instagram bio as a “soulpreneur.” I thought about what this could mean for a full five minutes and still couldn’t come up with anything. Carlton describes himself as a social media manager, which is fine, but LET US NOT FORGET he was Cynthia Bailey’s assistant on The Real Housewives of Atlanta, so Love is Blind is simply his way of continuing his foray into reality TV.
I’m definitely not trying to say that these people have fake jobs, because some of them do seem to run successful media companies, like Ebony Alexis (Ebony Alexis Entertainment) and Lille Mae (Glambitious I Am). However, I am saying that these are all jobs that function by gaining clients and serve to benefit from increased exposure to their brand. Production tried to throw us off the scent by throwing a bunch of tall, nondescript white men whose jobs are “scientist” and “engineer” into the mix, but I am not falling for it for one second.
Now, you may be thinking, so what if everyone was just there to promote their brand to a room of 30 singles that they already knew? But, I have to wonder, is love really blind if everyone is a model? Was the cast promised that everyone was going to be pretty attractive before they fully committed? Why was the show filmed so goddamn long ago? Everything about this show confuses me, and yet I have canceled all of my plans for Thursday night in order to watch the finale.
Images: Love Is Blind / Netflix, Giphy
